Megan Madonna

Education

• Ph.D. Duke University, 2020

Positions

• Assistant Research Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering

Awards, Honors, and Distinctions

• DEED Best Paper Award Finalist. American Society of Engineering Design in Engineering Education Division. 2025
• Integrating Virtue Together Fellowship. Notre Dame. 2025
• Emerging Pedagogies Seed Grant. Duke University Learning Innovation and Lifelong Education. 2024
• BMES Burroughs Wellcome Young Investigator Award. BMES. 2022

Courses Taught

• ISS 796T: Bass Connections Information, Society & Culture Research Team
• ISS 795T: Bass Connections Information, Society & Culture Research Team
• ISS 396T: Bass Connections Information, Society & Culture Research Team
• ISS 395T: Bass Connections Information, Society & Culture Research Team
• EHD 795T: Bass Connections Education & Human Development Research Team
• EHD 395T: Bass Connections Education & Human Development Research Team
• EGR 393: Research Projects in Engineering
• BME 791: Graduate Independent Study
• BME 494: Projects in Biomedical Engineering (GE)
• BME 493: Projects in Biomedical Engineering (GE)
• BME 462L: Design for the Developing World (DR)

Publications

• Mekha S, Sunassee E, Salgado M, Madonna M, Crouch B, Nair S, et al. Multi-probe Metabolic Fluorescence Microscopy Captures Poor Tumor Immunogenicity. In: Optical Molecular Probes Imaging and Drug Delivery Omp 2025 in Proceedings Optica Biophotonics Congress 2025 Part of Optica Biophotonics Congress Optics in the Life Sciences. 2025.
• Sunassee ED, Deutsch RJ, Du2019Agostino VW, Castellano-Escuder P, Siebeneck EA, Ilkayeva O, et al. Optical imaging reveals chemotherapy-induced metabolic reprogramming of residual disease and recurrence. Sci Adv. 2024 Apr 5;10(14):eadj7540.
• Sunassee ED, Deutsch RJ, Madonna MC, Crouch BT, Ramanujam N. Development of a multi-scale imaging tool to quantify in vivo metabolic heterogeneity. In: Progress in Biomedical Optics and Imaging Proceedings of SPIE. 2024.
• Du2019Agostino VW, Kwan M, Madonna MC, Crouch BT, Ramanujam N. A Multiplexed Quantitative Spectroscopy Method to Measure Spectrally Overlapping Metabolic Fluorophores. In: Novel Optical Materials and Applications Noma 2024 in Proceedings Advanced Photonics Congress 2024 Part of Optica Advanced Photonics Congress. 2024.
• Sunassee ED, Jardim-Perassi BV, Madonna MC, Ordway B, Ramanujam N. Metabolic Imaging as a Tool to Characterize Chemoresistance and Guide Therapy in Triple-Negative Breast Cancer (TNBC). Molecular cancer researchu202f: MCR. 2023 Oct;21(10):995u20131009.
• Sunassee ED, Crouch B, Madonna M, Palmer G, Ramanujam N. In Vivo Metabolic Imaging Reveals Mitochondrial Membrane Potential Reprogramming During Residual Disease Following Chemotherapy. In: Optical Molecular Probes Imaging and Drug Delivery Omp 2023. 2023.
• Deutsch RJ, Wang R, Sunassee ED, Madonna MC, Crouch BT, Ramanujam N. Development of a multi-scale platform to quantify metabolic heterogeneity in vivo. In: Optical Molecular Probes Imaging and Drug Delivery Omp 2023. 2023.
• Breen KC, Dotson ME, Madonna MC, Asturias G, Peu00f1a DM, Springate H, et al. Community-Centered Design Thinking as a Scalable Stem Learning Intervention. Advances in Engineering Education. 2023 Jan 1;11(2):2u201333.
• Madonna MC, Duer JE, McKinney BJ, Sunassee ED, Crouch BT, Ilkayeva O, et al. In vivo metabolic imaging identifies lipid vulnerability in a preclinical model of Her2+/Neu breast cancer residual disease and recurrence. NPJ Breast Cancer. 2022 Sep 26;8(1):111.
• Ramanujam N, Madonna M. Editorial overview: Biomedical engineering and women's health: Breaking new ground in gender- and sex-specific research. Current Opinion in Biomedical Engineering. 2022 Jun 1;22.
• Deutsch RJ, Du2019Agostino VW, Sunassee ED, Kwan M, Madonna MC, Palmer G, et al. A Spectroscopic Technique to Simultaneously Characterize Fatty Acid Uptake, Mitochondrial Activity, Vascularity, and Oxygen Saturation for Longitudinal Studies In Vivo. Metabolites. 2022 Apr 19;12(5).
• Solingapuram Sai KK, Chen X, Li Z, Zhu C, Shukla K, Forshaw TE, et al. [¹⁸F]Fluoro-DCP, a first generation PET radiotracer for monitoring protein sulfenylation in vivo. Redox biology. 2022 Feb;49:102218.
• Madonna MC, Duer JE, Lee JV, Williams J, Avsaroglu B, Zhu C, et al. In Vivo Optical Metabolic Imaging of Long-Chain Fatty Acid Uptake in Orthotopic Models of Triple-Negative Breast Cancer. Cancers (Basel). 2021 Jan 5;13(1).
• Madonna MC, Duer J, Fox D, Alvarez J, Ramanujam N. In vivo metabolic imaging reveals mitochondrial membrane potential reprogramming following Her2-targeted therapy and dormant disease. In: Optics Infobase Conference Papers. 2020.
• Madonna M, Duer J, Lee J, Williams J, Avsaroglu B, Zhu C, et al. In vivo optical metabolic imaging of long-chain fatty acid uptake in orthotopic models of triple negative breast cancer. 2020;
• Madonna MC, Fox DB, Crouch BT, Lee J, Zhu C, Martinez AF, et al. Optical Imaging of Glucose Uptake and Mitochondrial Membrane Potential to Characterize Her2 Breast Tumor Metabolic Phenotypes. Molecular cancer researchu202f: MCR. 2019 Jul;17(7):1545u201355.
• Zhu C, Li M, Vincent T, Martin HL, Crouch BT, Martinez AF, et al. Simultaneous in vivo optical quantification of key metabolic and vascular endpoints reveals tumor metabolic diversity in murine breast tumor models. J Biophotonics. 2019 Apr;12(4):e201800372.
• Ou2019Grady KP, Kavanaugh TE, Cho H, Ye H, Gupta MK, Madonna MC, et al. Drug-Free ROS Sponge Polymeric Microspheres Reduce Tissue Damage from Ischemic and Mechanical Injury. ACS Biomaterials Science and Engineering. 2018 Apr 9;4(4):1251u201364.
• Morhard R, Nief C, Barrero Castedo C, Hu F, Madonna M, Mueller JL, et al. Development of enhanced ethanol ablation as an alternative to surgery in treatment of superficial solid tumors. Sci Rep. 2017 Aug 18;7(1):8750.
• Forry SP, Madonna MC, Lu00f3pez-Pu00e9rez D, Lin NJ, Pasco MD. Automation of antimicrobial activity screening. AMB Express. 2016 Dec 1;6(1).
• Zhu C, Martinez AF, Hu F, Li M, Madonna MC, Lee M, et al. Integrated dual-modal microscope for imaging of key metabolic and vascular endpoints in preclinical cancer models. In: Optics Infobase Conference Papers. 2016.
• Poole KM, Patil CA, Nelson CE, McCormack DR, Madonna MC, Duvall CL, et al. Longitudinal study of arteriogenesis with swept source optical coherence tomography and hyperspectral imaging. In: Progress in Biomedical Optics and Imaging Proceedings of SPIE. 2013.
• Eller K, Madonna M. [Work in progress: Intersection of Design and u201cXu201d Research Papers] Global means local too: Integrating anti-oppressive practice into community-based capstone design projects. (Accepted) In: 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition  Proceedings. ASEE Conferences;
• Ayres J, Lee H, Huang A, Knudsen D, Ramanujam N, Madonna M. Ignite: Place-based Community-centered Design to Promote Biomedical Engineering Efficacy (Accepted). In: 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition  Proceedings. ASEE Conferences;

In The News

• Duke Instructors are Changing the Narrative around Grading at Duke (Sep 30, 2025 | )
• Championing Innovative Grading and Assessment at Duke (Mar 28, 2025 | )
• Ignite Helps Students Illuminateu2014and Solveu2014Problems in Their Own Community (May 8, 2024 | )
• Announcing the Inaugural Cohort of Emerging Pedagogies Seed Grant Recipients and Faculty Fellows (Apr 30, 2024 | )
• Museum Partnerships Serve as Roots for Growing Kidsu2019 STEM Identity (Mar 21, 2024 | )
• Celebrating a Spring Filled with Awards (Apr 26, 2023 | )